A New Aspect of Domestic Terrorism

The Muslim convert who shot two U.S. Army soldiers in Little Rock, Arkansas on June 1st may herald the beginning of a type of terrorism that is relatively new to the United States, but is very familiar to Israelis, Iraqis, the Irish, and other nationalities.

We in the USA have seen criminal attacks by lone gunmen before: Charles Whitman, who killed 14 people at the University of Texas, mostly from atop a tower, in 1966; Patrick Purdy - the Stockton, California school shootings in 1989, for example. But in other parts of the world, similar attacks have been carried out for political reasons: U.S. Army Colonel Nick Rowe was assigned to provide counter-insurgency training to the Armed Forces of the Phillipines. In 1989, on his way to work one morning, Colonel Rowe's vehicle was ambushed and he was shot dead by two Filipinos.

So, what has been happening around the world for decades has come to America; the deliberate assassination of individuals for political or religious motives. The shooting of the two soldiers, and the subsequent discovery on the assassin's computer of other targets indicates the possibility that this was more than just one lunatic's plan to get even with the world. At best, he alone intended to target other individuals. At worst he is part of a conspiracy--a terrorist group--to attack americans on our own soil. If the history of other nations is anything to go by, sooner or later, politically motivated assassinations of targeted individuals will occur here. We may very well have already seen the first. The big advantage an attacker has is that he blends in with the locals right up to the point where he begins his attack. Mao said that a terrorist is a fish in a sea of humanity, and he was right.

The question is, how do we handle such attacks? As a nation, we can no longer expect our military to be the first and only line of defense as we have done up to now with wars overseas such as Iraq and Afghanistan. Likewise, we cannot expect our police, from the FBI at the federal level to individual state, county, and city departments, to prevent attacks or stop them once they are under way. The cops cannot be everywhere, and it's likely that they would be unable to respond to such an attack in time.

The answer lies with us, as civilians. Fortunately, we live in a country where some form of concealed or open carry of a firearm is allowed in about 48 of the fifty states. Somewhere there is a statistic that says that armed, law-abiding civilians shoot (in self-defense) about the same number of violent criminals each year as the police do. That means that there is at least a chance in many parts of the country that if a terrorist attack similar to the one in Little Rock happens, an armed citizen or two might be on hand to deal with it.

We have only to look at what types of attacks occur in other countries to see what we might be up against here; shootings and bombings. The Israelis have lots of experience in dealing with both. When a terrorist has shot up a restaurant or some other public place, Israeli civilians have defended themselves and those around them, and in many cases they have prevailed. Defense against a terrorist wearing an explosive vest--a homicide bomber--is tougher because these people have no intention of living through the attack. But nonetheless, a well placed round or two in the brain box may prevent an explosion, or at least stop the attacker before he enters a building.

There are no easy solutions to the problem of people who look like the rest of us right up until the point where they launch their attack on civilians. The goal of people in this country should be to ensure that we are not helpless or hapless civilians. Concealed carry is an essential tool, but so is constant vigilance, which we strive for by living in Condition Yellow--being constantly aware of our surroundings. We can learn the easy way from the lessons of other countries now, or we can learn the hard way from attacks here later.